Pride and Prejudice
By
Jane Austen
Character Analysis
Jane Bennet

The oldest and most beautiful of the Bennet daughters, Jane has a good heart and a gentle nature. As Elizabeth's confidant, Jane helps to keep her sister's tendency to be judgmental in check by offering positive interpretations of negative situations. Jane's desire to see only the best in people becomes rather extreme at times, as in her disbelief that Wickham could be a liar, but she is not so entrenched in her world view that her opinion cannot be changed. Take, for example, her relationship with Caroline Bingley. When Jane finally recognizes Miss Bingley's insincerity, she stops making excuses for her and does not pursue the friendship. However, when she and Miss Bingley become sisters-in-law, Jane's good nature causes her to receive Miss Bingley's friendly overtures with more responsiveness than Miss Bingley deserves.

Although Jane enters into one of the happiest and most successful marriages in the novel, her relationship with Bingley is a rather static one. Just as she is consistently good and kind, her feelings and regard for Bingley never falter or change. She feels sorrow when he leaves, of course, but that does not diminish her love for him. Their relationship, while pleasant, is not marked by the range of emotions that Elizabeth and Darcy feel for one another. Her marriage, then, is favorable because she and Bingley married for love and are compatible, but it is not quite ideal because it lacks the depth found in Elizabeth and Darcy's marriage.